"Cockroach" protests had an impact: Indian Prime Minister promised free exam assistance and artificial intelligence training for young people
The pledges target exam costs and AI skills for young Indians as anger over leaked papers and scarce secure work pressures the education system.
laupäev, 15. august 2026 09:27
Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi promised free online exam coaching and AI training for 10mn young people in an Independence Day speech at Delhi’s Red Fort on Saturday, the Financial Times reported.
Modi, speaking from the ramparts of the 17th-century Mughal-era Red Fort to mark the 79th anniversary of independence from Britain, did not directly address demonstrations held the previous month. He said his government would ease financial pressures on young Indians and harness their “immense potential”.
“Competition surrounding coaching classes has become a huge burden for middle-class families,” Modi said. He added: “Every parent feels that if they do not send their child to a coaching centre, they are somehow falling behind or do not belong to a respectable family.”
The pledges followed protests by hundreds of thousands of young Indians over leaked highly competitive exam papers and a lack of opportunities. The demonstrations were led by the Cockroach Janta Party, which began earlier this year as a social media-fuelled satirical movement after India’s chief justice described unemployed youth as cockroaches.
The CJP became a channel for frustration over corruption in the education sector and the scarcity of secure, well-paid work. Nearly 40 per cent of graduates aged 20 to 24 are unemployed, according to data from the Centre for Monitoring Indian Economy, a forecasting company.
Police in Delhi fired tear gas and baton-charged demonstrators during the protests. Modi’s government later backed tougher legal penalties for exam leaks and created a panel to review the examination system, while the education minister resigned, one of the protesters’ principal demands.
Modi also said India’s youth would be “fully harnessed in nation-building” and would benefit from his Viksit Bharat, or Developed India, ambition to turn the country into a developed economy by 2047. In the roughly 75-minute speech, he outlined plans for more semiconductor plants, five additional nuclear reactors this decade and alternative energy sources, saying: “Energy security is crucial.”
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